Nomiya Izakaya — Restaurant in George Town

I am shocked at the low rating of this wonderful restaurant. Looks like all the low reviews are bias towards the slow service. This is not what I experienced for lunch, but may quite possibly be the case for dinner if they only have 2 waiters. I'd suggest getting a waiter constantly keeping watch on the entrance for table service.

The waiter that served me was quite attentive to detail, gave me suggestions and ideas about my order where needed.

I had the spicy ramen. Unlike Ippudo, you can't choose the noodle hardness here. But the taste here is definitely better and at a lower price for lunch menu (RM19.90). My only complaint is that there are too much broth and this overshadowed the presentation, the sliced pork belly, seaweed and perfectly cooked onsen egg (温泉卵).

Gyoza in the lunch set was made tasteless intentionally so you can simply control the taste for yourself using noodle broth, chill oil, soy sauce or something else. As comparison, Ippudo's gyoza had thick skin with less filling, this has a very good ratio. The small salad was fresh as well.

Salmon belly nigiri was awesome. You can actually taste the umami flavour from the salmon as it melts into your mouth. The other version of salmon nigiri was meh, though.

The berry lemonade might be slightly too sweet, for me anyway. (Slightly too many berries)

Not to mention the great decor, ambiance and Japanese music playing in the...

I had dinner at this Japanese restaurant, and to be honest, the food was pretty average. What caught my attention was that they also serve some western dishes, which is quite an interesting mix. I even noticed they had a Wagyu burger on promotion.

I ordered a bowl of Hakata Tonkotsu Ramen. The food was served quickly and surprisingly, it was very warm. You could really feel the heat, and the portion was quite generous. Unfortunately, the taste didn’t quite meet my expectations. It was just okay, which left me a little disappointed.

That said, the service was great. My friend wanted to order a plate of gyoza, and the staff checked with the kitchen first to see if it was available before taking the order. I appreciated that level of attentiveness.

The food is a bit pricey for the taste but overall, it’s still a decent place for dinner if you're around...

Strictly speaking this is not a Japanese restaurant, although the main entrance has a strong Japanese feel. It is a restaurant which serves Japanese and western foods.

They provided Japanese set meals even on Sundays. The price is very reasonable. However, the taste of the food is not that good. We ordered the Kushiyaki Don and the stewed meats had no taste. The Tonkosu Ramen is also not good. It has only two small pieces of belly pork (or Japanese Char Siew) (probably because the price of the set is low and they have to reduce the size of the meat). The sliced meats are hard. The texture of noodle is not good as well. It tasted like instant noodles. The egg is a full boiled egg which is rarely found in traditional Japanese ramen. Luckily, the soup base is not too bad.

If you are looking for good Japanese food, I will not recommend this...